


Wolves of Stardust

by Synapse



Series: The Ghost Diaries [1]
Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Bonding, Constellations, Fluff, Gen, Late Night Conversations, Legends, Nightmares, Season 1, Spacemom and Spaceson, Stargazing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-26 15:20:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18719728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Synapse/pseuds/Synapse
Summary: When nightmares come to call, Hera and Ezra spend some time together, and learn more about Lothal- and themselves- along the way.





	Wolves of Stardust

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a little late to the Rebels fandom- and when I say a little, I mean about four years. I started watching last September and finished in January, and about a fourth of the way in, I was already obsessed. I've been enjoying exploring since then- this is such a wonderful group of characters and a delightful community.
> 
> I've written a decent amount about the crew, but this is the first piece I feel confident enough to post. I've always thought Hera and Ezra's relationship didn't get enough attention in the show, so it's fun to think about how they got close over the years and what that must've been like. 
> 
> Originally I intended to post this for the Fourth, but the rewrite took longer than expected. Here it is anyway!

Nightmares don’t chase Ezra very often these days (not yet), but there are still times when he wakes late at night, soaked and shivering, with his family’s names on his lips.

Some of those nights, he turns over and stares at the chrono until he falls asleep again, and by the next morning it’s forgotten. Others, when the chrono’s ticked away for minute after minute and his thudding heart still hasn't slowed, he climbs from his bunk. Occasionally Kanan’s up, sitting vigil in the cockpit, or, when he’d sensed Ezra’s distress, coming to talk to his padawan. Those nights are the nights when Ezra pads out of his room only to discover his master with a hot cup of tea and an offered hug, and they meditate or talk or just sit in silence and enjoy one another’s company.

But other nights Kanan is, for once, enjoying sounder sleep than Ezra. So he just does what he's always done: he finds the nearest piece of sky.

Tonight, when the Inquisitor's blade cleaves his dreams in two, he drags his hand-woven blanket to the cockpit. Having settled himself into the copilot’s seat, he tilts it back and stares up. Far above him, the stars and moons wheel across the heavens, the golden grasses of Lothal turning silver beneath their fair light. He smiles, and begins to search.

First is one tiny, dimly pinkish star, the tip of the tail of the Lothrat constellation. Next is the Lothcat, then the Lothwolf, chasing each other in an eternal ring around the planet. Their great shapes are outlined in silver starlight, the lines connecting them formed of nothing but the magic of imagination. 

He drops his eyes to the horizon. Just above its edge the Lothbat soars, vast wings spread. His parents had told him the story of the bat many times as they lay stargazing: taken in by convors, the little Lothbat had believed himself to be a convor too. In that story the Lothbat had realized what he truly was, and rejoined his family. They had always stayed friends with the convors.

It wasn’t until he was on the streets that he heard the other version. The version where the Lothbat was eaten, instead.

His smile fades. Sighing, he buries his head in his blanket- then jumps as the doors hiss open behind him.

“Ezra?”

Scrambling to recover, he claws his blanket back around him and looks up. Hera, dressed in a nightgown, robe, slippers and a loose head covering, raises a placating hand. The other holds a steaming cup of something sweet. 

“It’s just me,” she says gently, and comes to sit beside him in the pilot’s chair. “Couldn’t sleep?”

“No,” he admits.

“Me neither.” She sips at the cup.

They sit in silence for a little while, but it's not as calming as before. Eventually he moves to leave. His mind isn’t the least bit quieted, but he can’t help but hate the silence. It’s not so bad with Kanan- he’s used to it, thanks to meditation- but anyone else…

Hera’s voice stops him before he can get farther than rising from his seat. “There’s a lot of stars here,” she says, her voice nearly a whisper. “On Ryloth, we tell stories about ours. We would draw shapes in them, and share the ancient legends, passed on from generation to generation. They were about everything- the Blurrgs, the Herdsmen, the Freedom Fighters… even Jedi. When I was a little girl my mother and father would sit with me and show me all of them.”

He blinks, then sits back down. “Um… we do the same thing. I mean. Tell stories, that is.”

She nods. “A lot of cultures do. But it’s incredible to hear how different the stories are. One star can mean very different things from planet to planet.”

"Really?" he says. "That's cool." A moment passes. Then-

“I could… tell you some of ours?” He picks at a loose loop in his blanket. “If you want, I mean.”

“Only if you feel comfortable, Ezra.”

“Well- no- I mean, it’s fine.” He extricates one arm from under his blanket, then points. “That’s the nose of the Lothwolf.”

“That one?”

“Uh-huh. It’s one of the most important stars, because it doesn’t move. I guess you know this already, but- the rest of the stars, they move, right? Because of how Lothal orbits, and stuff. But the Lothwolf’s nose doesn’t move. So we use it to tell where to go.”

“Ryloth has a star like that too.” 

“Yeah, I guess if you had one where the Lothwolf’s nose is for Lothal on other planets that… would work? I never really thought about it.”

“People don’t, usually, unless they move around a lot.” 

“Like you and Kanan and everyone else do,” he says. 

“Yes, but on some planets, like Garel, it’s very difficult to see the stars. There’s too much light from the cities, or the atmosphere is too thick, or other reasons. Lothal has one of the clearest skies we’ve seen in a while.” 

“Oh,” Ezra says, and goes quiet for a moment. Then he points to a new star. “So… that’s the tail of the Lothwolf, and there’s his heart, and that’s his front paw-” Carefully he points out each one, then goes back to the tail. “So right behind the Lothwolf is the Lothcat-" he traces a finger through the Lothcat's shape- "and then there’s the Lothrat.” He shows her the five stars for the Lothrat, then adds,”My mom and dad always told me about how they chased each other across the night sky all the time. There’s a lot of different reasons why, though.”

Hera nods. “Because of the order they’re chasing each other in?”

“Yeah. ‘Cause, like, that’s not how it works usually, right? Like I said- there’s a lot of stories why. The one I always heard on the streets was the rat was getting revenge on the cat, and the cat got it on the wolf, but…” He hesitates, and looks to Hera. She nods encouragingly.

“But, well,” he says slowly. “My parents… they always told me something different. My dad told me about how they weren’t chasing each other, they were just following each other. The Lothwolf always leads, because the Lothwolves worked in packs, before they disappeared. They were team players, y’know? Like us.” He feels a little foolish saying it, but Hera smiles at him.

“Like us,” she agrees, and he goes on.

“But, like, the Lothcats, they’re more independent. So they wouldn’t normally be really good leaders, because they aren’t good team players. But they were really good at working in pairs, or doing stuff Lothwolves couldn’t. And the Lothrats tended to fight a lot with each other. But because they were so tiny and there were so many of them and because they were underestimated, they could do a lot of stuff quietly and fix a lot of things that the Lothcats and Lothwolves couldn’t fix by themselves. So when they followed the Lothcat’s help and the Lothwolves’ leadership they worked together really well, and they could make a lot of stuff change.” 

He stops and looks at Hera again, who looks thoughtful as she takes another sip.

“It’s a good story,” she agrees. “But where are the Lothwolves now? You said they disappeared.” 

“They’re gone,” he sighs. “We don’t know what happened to them, just that we haven’t seen them in the last century. They used to be around a lot more, I think. There’s a lot of stories about them, anyway. I kinda wish they’d come back. They fixed a lot of bad things.”

“So Lothal needs the Lothwolves to help lead them out of the Empire?”

“Yeah.”

“But without them, Lothal can’t be freed.” She says it slowly, considering. “So maybe Lothal needs someone else to be its Lothwolves."

“...what do you mean?”

“Maybe we need to be the leaders, Ezra. Maybe we need to be Lothal’s Lothwolves, so we can lead your people out of the Empire.”

He stares at her with wide eyes. “Us? Lothwolves? But we can’t change into giant wolves!” 

“No, no,” Hera laughs gently. “We need to show the people of Lothal how to fight back, show them what they need to do to get out from under the Empire. We need to be Lothwolves to lead the Lothcats, the fighters among the people, and then they can lead the Lothrats- the people of Lothal.” 

“Oh,” Ezra murmurs. “I think I’d like that. Yeah.” A grin begins to spread across his face. “Us, being the Lothwolves." 

Hera grins back at him.

“Woof,” he adds, and she laughs. 

Later, when he’s finished pointing out a few more constellations, she suggests that they go back to bed. “Yeah,” he agrees, yawning, and hops out of the copilot’s seat, keeping the blanket as close around himself as he can without falling over. “Night, Hera.” 

“Goodnight, Ezra.” 

That night he doesn’t dream of his hands being torn from his mother’s, or the red blades of the Inquisitor. 

He dreams, instead, of wolves of stardust.

**Author's Note:**

> I've always loved the headcanon that Ezra weaves. So, yes, his blanket is handwoven. In the original draft for this I had it described as "cobalt and violet and gold, woven from warmly dyed fabric and with his own two hands." I scrapped it in the editing process, but I love the idea that he made one to reflect his home planet. Maybe in reality he wouldn't have had enough time- but it's fun to dream.
> 
> I love Lothal. In particular I love the skies, and some of those nighttime scenes (Ezra and Dume comes to mind)- it's just such a beautiful planet, and the animators did a great job making it stand out. I'm really hoping we learn more about its history at some point, because those cave paintings, and of course the wolves and temple, have left way too many unanswered questions. But in the meantime, we might as well make up some of our own stories.
> 
> Do other planets have north stars? I feel like they would, but I'm not sure. In any case, here's a headcanon that Lothal and Ryloth do.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed! Constructive criticism is appreciated, as always.


End file.
